2020.
During the COVID-19 pandemic, the United States Army constructed $50 million temporary field hospitals on the campus of Stony Brook University. However, the beds were dismantled in 2021 without ever being used. A $63.4 million renovation of the Stony Brook Union was completed during the pandemic and opened in 2020.
=== Flagship status era ===
On January 5, 2022, New York Governor Kathy Hochul officially designated Stony Brook University and the University at Buffalo as the two flagship universities of the State University of New York system. The announcement came with the dedication of a new $100 million multidisciplinary engineering building. About three weeks later, Stony Brook announced its departure from the America East Conference after 21 years to the Colonial Athletic Association, effective July 1, 2022. Later that year, distinguished professor Dennis Sullivan earned the 2022 Abel Prize, the top honor in mathematics.
In the 2022–23 edition of the U.S. News & World Report national college rankings, …